On the 11th of May, Supreme Court Chief Justice Scott ordered Clare Mafi and Alunga Katoa, both formerly of Kalia Travel to pay the equivalent of $16,440 TOP plus interest to the plaintiff Mr John Cvetko. This was from monies initially paid to Kalia travel for two separate travel bookings between October and December 2010. In the first instance Kalia Travel took payment for an international trip for Mr Cvetko’s family to attend a family wedding in Indonesia. The passengers were left stranded in Sydney where they had to buy new tickets to travel further and then back to Tonga. A day before departure the family had also paid Kalia Travel for tickets to visit their son’s grandparents for Christmas. They found out on return that this money had also been retained by Kalia travel.
Clare Mafi, is the owner of Kalia travel, and since the legal action was commenced by Mr. Cvetko, Kalia Travel has closed its doors. Mr Cvetko believes his continued action has saved many Tongans the heartache of falling into the same trap by making this case public and pursuing it through the courts. Clare Mafi’s husband, Chris Mafi and Alunga Katoa had also been charged by police for theft and embezzlement over the same case and Mr. Cvetko is yet to hear the progress of that case.
Mr Cvetko stated that he was pleased with the judgment against Clare Mafi and Alunga Katoa and that he would be pursuing both of them to pay the money in full. He said that to date, neither Clare Mafi nor Alunga Katoa have paid the money owed to him pursuant to the Court order of 11 May.
Mr Cvetko said that this type of behavior continues to happen among a few travel agents in Tonga and not many weeks go by without him getting a call about another person who has turned up at the airport to find their booking is not in the system and the travel agent has kept the money. Mr. Cvetko also advises that travel agents are known to use the credit card of unsuspecting travellers to buy tickets for other travellers. In one case he heard of one person’s credit card being charged $15,000 TOP of extra tickets.
Mr Cvetko said that his was only one of many cases and that travel agents believe they can get away with this illegal behavior thinking no one will chase them. He stated “I hear stories of travel agents apologising and promising to pay back the travelers, however in many cases after some small payments, no other payments are made and the local Tongan clients feel helpless to do anything else”. He adds, “I find it very disappointing that a few Tongan travel agents believe they can take the money of unsuspecting Tongans this way”.
When asked about his thoughts on Clare Mafi again being associated to a travel agency in Nuku’alofa, he stated, “I certainly won’t be recommending those services”. Mr. Cvetko was unable to comment further stating that given Mafi & Katoa’s failure to follow the orders of the court to date, further enforcement action was being initiated to recover the money. He did however add that he was astounded that people could break the law, be ordered by the law to correct the situation and then still ignore the orders of the court.
